


Here There Be Dragons

by FairyTrashMother



Series: Tales From The Edges of The Map [2]
Category: Original Work
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-19
Updated: 2019-08-19
Packaged: 2020-09-18 18:35:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 590
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20317612
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FairyTrashMother/pseuds/FairyTrashMother
Summary: A small collection of short stories I've written





	Here There Be Dragons

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote these when I was in college, and I thought I should put them somewhere. I may or may not write some more as we go.

The ocean rolled in and out around his feet, tugging at his toes, asking him to come play. He remembered the maps is father had shown him, the ones that said “Here There Be Dragons”. His sister told him that there weren’t any such thing, that they were whales or animals that had been mistaken for something more grand and magical by silly old people who hadn’t known any better. But the boy was sure that if there could be squids bigger than the bus that took him to school then there surely could be dragons at sea.

So the boy went down to the beach to see. He walked the beach and all around he saw people playing with bright plastic beach balls and laying out on bright colored towels, but nothing more magical than a few brightly colored snails in the tidal pools. He walked as far out as he could, up and down the beach as the sun set. The sky yawned rainbow and the sea turned black, as the burning red sun sank below the water and the people left. 

The boy sat and waited. The moon awoke and began her nightly stroll across the sky, waking the stars and calling them to come play, and come they did. Soon the night was bright and cool and full of the sound of the sea. Still the boy waited. 

And then, as low as the rumbling of the sea there was another noise. It was slow and rhythmic, not unlike a bed sheet flapping in the wind on a clothes line. The boy turned to see a huge dragon sailing on huge wings. It swooped over the sea to land beside him. He was sure that you were supposed to be scared of dragons, that he had heard stories of evil dragons, but he wasn’t a princess or a valiant knight, and calling this dragon evil without knowing it wasn’t fair, so he supposed he was safe. 

The dragon lowered a head that was bigger than even the boy and looked him in the eye. Hello little one. The dragon’s voice was deeper than the sea. Its scales shimmered like the water, its talons like the shiny shells in the tidal pools. 

The boy took a deep breath and decided there was no turning back. “Did you get my message?” 

Everybody knows that dragons, much like cats, cannot smile, but they can purr, and the dragon purred like distant cold seas washing agains huge stone cliffs. The boy smiled. His sister had also told him that a glass soda bottle with a message would never be received by anybody, that it would never get where it was going. But he knew better again, he had written a letter to the sea dragons and addressed it to 

The Sea Dragon  
Here There Be Dragons, The Sea. 

He had written that he wanted to explore what was beyond the edges of the maps. He wanted to sail to the end of the world and peek over the edge. And here was the dragon, offering him a ride. So he climbed aboard as and they flew to see what there was to see as the sun rose and the beach warmed.

As they shrank on the horizon with the rising sun at their backs, flying into the night to chase the moon and see what she hid the boy’s sister walked across the beach, watching them go with a smile, remembering when she had cast her bottle into the sea.


End file.
